


Written on the Body

by 7iris



Category: Eastern Promises
Genre: Gen, UST, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2008
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-17 00:42:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/171055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/7iris/pseuds/7iris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When they recruited him, they were not called the KGB anymore.</p><p>It did not matter much; their techniques remained the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Written on the Body

When they recruited him, they were not called the KGB anymore.

It did not matter much; their techniques remained the same.

*

He found Kirill in the baths in St. Petersburg. That was what it felt like—finding an unrecognized treasure, an unpolished gem.

Kirill had the stars on his shoulders and his knees, but only a few other tattoos. He had a bodyguard, a strong, squat bull of a man with no stars of his own, but a long history of crime and punishment inked on his torso. Kirill laughed easily, expansively, and the sound bounced off the tiled walls. He seemed half-drunk already, oblivious to the silent disapproval of his bodyguard and the tight-jawed resentment of his companions.

Nikolai recognized the men with him, Georgians who smuggled girls into the city brothels, not important or well-connected. Nikolai didn't know who Kirill was, then, but he knew _what_ he was: the son of a powerful _Vory v Zakone_ , raised with too much status and not enough responsibility. He was the only one in the room with stars. He knew it, and made sure everyone else knew it, too.

The Georgians left first amidst low muttering and knife-edge glances. Nikolai followed a few minutes later. He felt Kirill and the bodyguard watching him as he crossed the steam room, reading his own history in his tattoos. The bodyguard's expression was wary and calculating, but there was something hot and interested in Kirill's eyes. So much the better.

Outside, it was snowing, dry and thin, and the air was so cold it burned against his skin. He walked to the end of the block. He didn't see the Georgians, but he hadn't expected to. Around the corner, he stopped, stepping back into the shadow of a doorway, and waited.

They killed the bodyguard before Nikolai got to them.

He slammed into the one who'd grabbed Kirill, the butterfly knife already open in his hand, slicing through the Georgian's throat like butter. He was dimly aware of Kirill shouting curses, the burn of a knife across his shoulder as he turned to the second attacker, but everything fell away in the rush of the moment. The third man had a gun.

Nikolai never saw the fourth man.

*

When he woke up, he was tied to a chair. Pain throbbed in his head and in the knife wound in his shoulder. The room was dark and silent and cold, and then suddenly it wasn't.

Lights came on and the door opened and two men came in dragging Kirill between them, still cursing. They threw him down on the floor, cuffed him when he wouldn't stay down.

A third man came in behind them, his gaze lazy and faintly amused. There was a fourth man behind him, small and mousy and carrying a doctor's satchel.

Nikolai's gut went cold and his balls tried to climb back up inside his body when he saw that.

"So," said the third man. "Let's talk about how much your father wants you back, and what exactly we will do to you if he doesn't."

"Fuck you," Kirill said, and spit in his face.

The other man's smile got wider. "Let's start with some visual aids."

*

They stopped after a little while, when a messenger came in to see the leader.

They had switched to Kirill fairly quickly, when it became apparent that Nikolai could take a lot of damage in silence, and that Kirill didn't care that much about Nikolai.

Kirill wasn't quite screaming when the little mousy man stepped back.

Nikolai panted and watched the three other men have a short, sharp conversation. They left after a minute.

The little mousy man stood there with his bloody scalpel and watched them.

Kirill was on the floor, on his back, staring up at the ceiling. He started laughing, and there was something shrill and faintly hysterical in it. The little mousy man frowned.

"What?" he said. "Why are you laughing?"

Kirill kept laughing, and the man stepped closer. "What?" he said again, and then kicked at Kirill's side.

Kirill stopped laughing and whipped an arm out, shockingly fast, to catch the man's foot. He pulled and twisted, and the man went down with a shout. Kirill scrambled up and slammed the man's head down on the floor, once, twice, three times, until Nikolai heard something crack and squelch.

"I am laughing," Kirill said, "because my father is going to kill you all."

Kirill looked up at him then, and Nikolai was afraid for one breathless instant that he was going to kill him, too, just for being there.

But Kirill blinked, and his expression eased, and he used the scalpel to cut him free.

He was still kneeling at Nikolai's side when the door opened and one of the other men appeared.

Nikolai pushed Kirill down to the side and pulled the scalpel out of his hand while the other man was drawing his gun. He reversed the scalpel and threw it. It wasn't balanced right, but Nikolai had aim born from desperation and it struck home in the man's eye.

For one long moment, the only sound in the room was their harsh, panting breaths.

Finally, Nikolai stood up. "Come on," he said, and held out a hand to Kirill.

*

He took Kirill back to one of his safe houses, a tiny, filthy apartment with no heat. It was one he wouldn't mind abandoning once Kirill and his people knew about it.

He got out the first aid kit and a bottle of vodka. He didn't bother with glasses.

"You have other people here, yes?" Nikolai asked. "People who can protect you?"

Kirill shrugged. "Do you know who I am?"

Nikolai shook his head, and Kirill told him.

It was better than Nikolai had hoped. He let Kirill see his intake of breath, and Kirill smirked. "I have people here, yes, but what fucking good are they? The best is dead on the street back there."

Kirill took another swig of vodka. Nikolai cleaned and bandaged the cuts on Kirill's chest, all thin and shallow. The little mousy man had only really just started with them.

Nikolai took off his jacket, and the motion reminded him of the cut on his shoulder, deeper and more painful than the scalpel cuts.

He couldn't reach the bottom of the knife wound himself.

"Here," Kirill said, and took the rag out of Nikolai's hand. He wiped the blood away.

"It's not bad," Nikolai said. He let Kirill tape a bandage in place; he could get stitches later.

Kirill's hands lingered on his back after he was done, sliding over the curve of his cathedral tattoos. Kirill walked around him, trailing his hand over Nikolai's ribs until his fingertips rested on the tattoo of the reaper on his side.

Kirill was tall enough that Nikolai had to look up to meet his eyes.

He felt his heartbeat kick up, felt a faint, weak echo of the adrenaline rush of fighting move through his blood.

Kirill was close enough to kiss him. Nikolai held very still. He had never been one of the Downcast in prison, never so much as touched one of them, but he had done worse than that to protect his cover. He held Kirill's gaze and waited.

"They dishonored my family by doing this," Kirill said, low and grim. "I am going to kill them all for this. Will you help me?"

"Yes," Nikolai said, and Kirill stepped back and smiled, sudden and bright and startling.

Nikolai's side was cold where Kirill's hand had been, and he felt something that was almost closer to disappointment than relief. He shook it off and went to get his guns.

  



End file.
